NSEIT acquires cyber security company Aujas

NSEIT, the IT services focused subsidiary of the National Stock Exchange has acquired Aujas Networks Ltd., a company which provides information security consulting and IT risk management services.

Founded in 2008, Aujas has operations in India, the Middle East and North America. It employs about 400 cyber security professionals and has over 390 customers globally. The service portfolio includes information risk advisory, identity & access management, threat management and security analytics.

NSEIT currently provides technology solutions across industries such as capital markets, financial markets, banking and insurance. It also provides services relating to algorithmic trading (ultralow latency system), order management system exchange connectivity, Pre-trade and post-trade risk management, regulatory and compliance management, surveillance, exchange adapters, exchange simulator, and mobile trading.

According to data from Crunchbase, Aujas has raised $11 million since 2008 from a slew of early stage venture capital funds in India, including Chiratae Ventures (then known as IDG Ventures), IvyCap Ventures and Rajasthan Venture Capital fund. Aujas last raised $5.4 million from the 3 investors in 2013.

Cure.fit acquires Seraniti

Health and Fitness startup CureFit has acquired integrated mental wellness platform Seraniti. CureFit has rebranded Seraniti clinics at Bengaluru and Pune as Mind.fit, which offers online, and offline yoga, meditation and therapy services.

Seraniti was founded in 2016 by mental health practitioner. It offers psychotherapy services through 15 in-house professionals. Its team assesses the users' requirement and matches them to the right therapist. Users can then book an appointment. Seraniti claims it undertakes about 500 sessions a month in Bengaluru and Pune.

The Seraniti app is no longer available for users. Seraniti customers will be transitioned to the Mind.fit fold and will have access to yoga and meditation centres and do-it-yourself tutorials. They can now book appointments though the Cure.fit app.

Mind.fit claims to be India’s largest yoga chain with a membership of about 11,000, conducting 160 classes a day across its over 70 centres. CureFit is backed by venture capital firms Accel Partners, Kalaari Capital and Chiratae Ventures, which was previously known as IDG Ventures India. It formally launched the flagship Cure.fit mobile app in May last year. 

Another offering is Cult.fit, which runs offline centres that offer equipment-less workouts including strength and conditioning exercises, spinning, boxing, mixed martial arts, zumba and yoga. Eat.fit is its subscription-based food delivery vertical while Mind.fit focuses on yoga and meditation. Its latest offering, Care.fit, offers a digital platform for doctors and health checkups.

NestAway Technologies acquires Zenify

Home rental startup NestAway Technologies Pvt. Ltd has acquired smaller rival Zenify (City Synapse Information Pvt. Ltd) for an undisclosed amount, a move that will help NestAway expand its offerings for families. Zenify will continue to operate as a separate entity after the acquisition.

NestAway manages a homeowner’s rental property throughout the rental life cycle, from showing the house to a prospective tenant and closing the rental agreement to collecting rent on the owner’s behalf and assisting the tenant and owner during move-out. The company charges a certain percentage of the monthly rent it generates from the house as commission.

The company, founded in 2015, started out as an aggregator of shared, furnished apartments for bachelors, before adding full homes for families. It claims to manage more than 10,000 homes in Bangalore, Delhi, Gurgaon, Noida, Ghaziabad, Hyderabad, Pune and Mumbai. The company’s investors include Tiger Global Management and IDG Ventures.

According to data platform Crunchbase, NestAway has so far raised $43 million from Tiger Global, IDG Ventures India, Flipkart Ltd. The company has also raised about $5-6 million in venture debt from InnoVen Capital. Its last equity finance, a $30-million Series C round, came in April last year. According to data from research firm Tofler, NestAway clocked revenue of Rs5.8 crore for the year ended 31 March 2016 while losses stood at Rs37 crore. Following the acquisition of Zenify, NestAway will have more than 4,000 homes on offer for families. The segment has also witnessed consolidation in the recent past. For instance, Quikr acquired Grabhouse in an all-stock deal for about $10 million in November last year.

CureFit buys Kristys Kitchen

Bangalore based healthcare and fitness start-up CureFit has acquired online health food delivery company, Kristys Kitchen for an undisclosed amount of cash and stock deal. CureFit Healthcare Pvt. Ltd provides services such as fitness advice and medicine deliveries.

Kristys Kitchen is in the segment of preparing and delivery of International healthy food cuisines. Founded in September 2016, the company has a kitchen in Bangalore and claims to be operationally cash positive and servicing over 250 orders a day. Backed by Kalaari Capital, Accel Partners and IDG Ventures, the company had raised $15 Million in Series-A round of funding last year in July. Later in August, CureFit acquired fitness centre brand Cult for $3 Million.

CureFit plans to offer it’s three main planned services – health food subscriptions, Cult Fitness subscriptions and mental wellness offering, focusing on prevention side of healthcare. Healthcare can be broadly divided into prevention and cure. Prevention has four important parts: eating healthy, active lifestyle, mental wellness, regular health check-ups. CureFit will be launching fitness, mental wellness—DIY (do-it-yourself) packs of yoga and meditation and food.

FirstCry to acquire BabyOye

Online Baby products seller FirstCry is acquiring Mahindra Retail, which runs offline stores under BabyOye brand, for about Rs 362 crore in a landmark deal in the Indian Retail Market. The Pune based startup will acquire the franchisee division of Mahindra Retail, part of the $18 Billion software to automobiles conglomerates Mahindra and Mahindra.

The deal is a stock transaction, under which FirstCry owner Brainbees Solutions will issue shares worth Rs 355 crore to Mahindra Group and pay Rs 7.5 crore in cash. The deal will help FirstCry, which already has 180 franchised stores; create one of the largest Omni-channel retail plays in the country, with a strong presence both online and offline. As a part of transaction, FirstCry has also raised Rs 226 crore in fresh funding form Mahindra Group and Switzerland Adveq, besides existing backers like IDG Ventures India, SAIF Partners, NEA and Vertex.

Mahindra Retail had expanded into the online baby care market last year with acquisition of BabyOye and also rebranded its offline stores from Mom & Me to the online brand. It has over 120 stores that are a combination of large format, high street and mall locations and hospital stores. Mahindra Retail acquired BabyOye.com in February 2015. FirstCry.com will have a parent base of over 4 Million, a footprint of over 300 stores spread across 125 cities.